Back at camp I was felling like a total chump for suggesting we try that road in the first place, and did my best to remove door panels to attempt to “pop out” the dents as best I could (and I couldn’t, BTW,) remove the dangling flare, and stay out of Ken’s way for a while. But all was well, and Ken took the high road and accepted full responsibility for the decision to run the trail, plus we know a great body repair guy back in Denver. The damage earned Ken quite a bit of attention that evening, and Rob from Kansas City was equipped with a sawzall, welder, and flex-tube and offered to repair the damaged section of tail pipe that night at camp. Ken took him up on the offer while I erected the shower tent and hooked up the hot water, and a few beers and a warm shower later the smiles were back on everyone’s faces.

Matt Farr showed up this evening as well, and was about 3 stories and 6 beers behind the rest of us, but did his best to catch up. He crashed in the Romer camper that night (and the next) and enjoyed meeting all the other TLCA folk in attendance. He also pulled up in his dad’s Jeep wrangler, and caught a nice dose of comments from everyone in the valley. By this point the camp area had close to 40 “trail ready” Toyotas, some tow vehicles, campers, tents, trailers, and was filling in nicely.